Тоска
by Fogs of Gray
Summary: If she allowed herself time to think, she would have seen the tragedy in it, as well as the patterns. As it was now, whenever she edged close to epiphany, she ran.
1. Тоска

Pronounced 'toska': At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia. At the lowest level it grades into boredom.

OR: "a state of agony and torment created by the sudden sight of one's own misery."**  
**

So, I'm afraid I may be quitting the fandom for a while. I'm running low on inspiration, unfortunately. As you will soon see, this one is **cliché beyond reason.** But someone asked me why I stopped writing. This is why. My writing has gone horribly wrong over the last few months. But, I warned you.

Spoilers: Beautiful Creatures, Beautiful Darkness

Disclaimer: Not my characters

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She was never a fan of storms. The rain and wind howling through the trees kept her awake; the thunder shook her soul. The lightning surged behind her closed eyes. All the chaos, the damage, for a small amount of rain. All the fear and anxiety, for a barely measurable relief. She didn't hate them, though, as some did. She understood the necessity of such turbulent events. She knew precisely why they occurred; be it from a difference of heat or a child's fear. And so she tolerated them, and when they came, she Traveled to a more pleasant climate.

Ironically, someone described the two of them as a storm. In the man's thought, Leah was the wind, invisible and deadly. Macon was the rain, steady and withering.

She allowed herself to muse the idea. In her mind, the man was wrong. He was focusing on the wrong elements. The two of them were too close, too connected for that.

Clichés aside, she considered herself lightning and her brother thunder. For a half witted thought, it made sense. She was brilliant and sharp. He was distant and fading. Together, as a team, their broken selves almost made sense.

She could catch an eye in a crowd, especially Macon's. Their gazes would lock and they would find time to talk. It wasn't perfect by any means. Most times she recovered from the recoil of Traveling only to search a group of Casters for a man who never existed in the room. Or black would meet black, and he would disappear in a turn of his coat. Other times were confined to short simple sentences, when company might overhear. _How is she?_ He knew she referred to Sarafine. _Fine_. She knew his response reflected the likeliness of Sarafine breaking Ravenwood's Binds. Others would assume 'she' meant Lena. Or Delphine. Of one of their numerous nieces. Others assumed far too much, in a time where a wayward breath caused turmoil.

She supposed that was part of the appeal, though. To swap a few words and convey a sentence that provoked a message different than your intent. It made everything safer. It gave them something to laugh about later; the predictability associated with Mortals didn't stop with them, unfortunately.

He was dying. Leah knew that better than the man himself. Which was her reasoning for labeling him as thunder. He invoked fear into whoever he wanted, and though his tirades could last a while, he calmed before long. He was tired, she knew that. Keeping up petty arguments took energy he couldn't afford to lose. She would say that was the poetic tragedy in him, if Leah allowed herself time to contemplate. He was still young, but he was worn thin enough he didn't take care of himself. He had nearly a hundred years to live, and he was preparing for his demise, hurling himself head first towards exhaustion.

She had asked him, in a moment of hysteria. "Are you afraid, Macon?" His eyes had found hers. "Lena asked earlier." The slipped easily. Lena was concerned. Not her. Lena.

"How did you answer?" His response was enthusiastically detached.

Leah had snorted from her spot in the chair opposite him, her hands loose on her knees. Her thoughts were a mess of gorgeous chaos, and if Macon had the energy, he would have seen it in her eyes. "You're terrified of losing her." Macon nodded once. "It isn't a lie, Macon."

"It isn't a truth, either, Leah." His fingers tightened as another ache spasmed. "Grace," he had replied, his voice trembling slightly, "the undoing of everything we've done to ourselves." He paused. "These last few days have had that, certainly. I expect the next year to, as well."

Leah didn't speak after that. There was something undeniably wrong with the statement, a distinct pull in her chest, a lull of her thoughts. She couldn't comprehend how he kept his head when she was losing hers. How he was collected in the face of a storm that threatened his life, smirked at its bracing winds and piercing cold that gripped his form.

When she would buckle he would build himself up. And when it came down to it, she supposed he built himself from the attacks placed on him. Where she withered at the obstacles thrown at her, he moved forward, constantly pushing himself further and further until his mind and body collapsed. When that happened he didn't slow, but forced himself to build advances and live with less. When she fell she burned, she crashed and, with bleeding hands, attempted to piece herself together again. He fortified himself from shattering, in light of the damage he faced. She let herself break.

She would crack and Macon found himself stuck in the crosshairs more than once. She would storm his office in a moment of anger and fear. She would rant about petty things, and he would set aside whatever he was working on to listen to her. And when she tore herself down to fearless sobs, where she was beyond the point of putting herself back together, he would, expertly. Somehow their roles reversed.

Leah knew it should have been the other way. She should be helping a breaking, trembling Macon. She had her life ahead of her and she still found ways to crack. He had a few years, and he didn't mind. It confounded her. Honestly, she knew Macon wasn't the kind to fall apart easily. He kept his façade brilliantly, and she wondered if he knew where the masks ended.

She supposed that's why she patched him up every time he injured himself. Why she kept coming back to help him with the stupidest of things and why she shied away that night in February. Because she was supposed to he fixing him, not the other way around. Because she would always remember him as the clear faced brother who sorted her problems, not the weakened man, wet from raindrops for the first time. She would watch as he slowly faded.

She would watch as he caught himself. Pretend not to see the way he gripped the back of a chair when standing, as though it was the only thing keeping him up. She would ignore the trembling of his hands, or the quiver in his letters. She thought of his whole deterioration as the fading of calamity.

She envied him for that. The constant, inevitable end he was racing toward. She was jealous of the idea, the thought of having an end. Her life spanned forward more than a hundred years. Long passed the death of Macon and the end of this storm. She was jealous, because he didn't run.

Because when she was threatened she ran. She fled to another place, killed a few people and moved on. She didn't allow herself time to think any more deeply into things. Because she knew what happened to Macon. She knew his thoughts tormented him enough to cause him insomnia, enough to drive him to near insanity. Which is why she attributed herself to lightning, chasing the skies in a frantic dance.

And maybe that was why she ran. Just as thunder came soon after lightning, Macon was soon behind Leah in times of trouble. She didn't stop running until a month after, when she understood Macon wouldn't, couldn't, come chasing after her. When she understood her thunder had finally died, and no amount of turmoil would bring him back.

Macon understood where his life was headed. He didn't fight it. But she struggled with the concept she would eventually have to face it as well, when she was in her prime with a future ahead of her. Somehow he, with nothing left, was more calm than she who had _everything_ to look forward to. Somehow the dimming thunder had accepted its martyred fate and the brilliant lightning clasped hysterically to life. Somehow, in the chaos and destruction, they found solace. Somehow, between the yelling and tears, they found themselves in each other's arms, one falling apart in an array of fury, and the other slowly fading into shadow.

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That's it. I'm writing Lestrade from now on.


	2. Ruse

*coughs* Well, I didn't mean to write this, but it's been pouring around here for a week now. Which is good, but it got me thinking. Demon Soldiers haven't felt rain. Simple, but I worked on it.

**So, my thoughts**: they can't feel rain for the same reason they don't have a heartbeat, because if they had those, they would believe their own ruse of being human.

Tada! I'm sure you already had that thought, but I ran with it. So, that's this plot in a nutshell. Have fun.

Disclaimer: Not my characters

Spoilers: If you squint, all books

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For all the spite she carried, mainly pointed at those pesky storms, she was oddly curious.

Not about things people were intrigued by. Not about history, what could only bring sadness, or the future, that brought disappointment. Or even about the present that had endless possibilities. She didn't care to look into herself; she was slightly intimidated by what she might find. She didn't find interest in the motives of her brothers, or motive in general. She didn't care who won some game or was given some title. They were petty things that faded with time. Which was why she found it odd she harbored a curiosity for precipitation, the most common of occurrences.

Mainly rain, if she could narrow it down. When she was barely a woman, someone had once called rain the tears of heaven. She didn't know whether to believe the woman or condemn her. The woman was certainly not correct, the logic argued. Oh, but the idea of having the heavens on your side, empathizing with your sorrows. Part of her found the appeal of it, and was almost glad for the woman. So, Leah did neither, but attempted to keep herself light.

She walked away with a sense of infuriating confusion, though. Confusion because rain, what she had grown to understand was untouchable, was entirely common to Mortals. In some small corner of her mind, she realized she didn't _know_ what rain was.

Of course, she knew the mechanics of it. It was a natural cycle of water. Simple. She understood that. But, she didn't know what it felt like to have water soak into her clothes, and dampen her hair. She had never seen the use of an umbrella, or a coat of any kind.

Sitting primly on the cliffs of Ireland, she had watched it. The clouds had been clumping for hours, and she was young. She was young and oh so curious. She closed her eyes and wondered if the minuscule droplets would be rough or soft. Either would have made sense. As rain was water vapor weighed by dust, she could see both. She knew she would never feel its caress down her neck, or its slow, cold embrace. And she started to understand why it didn't work.

Her first thought was of Casters. She had seen Lena playing in the rain countless times when Macon was too tired to leave the study. She would force herself to stay and watch Lena soak herself in the rain. It was a situation she found herself in too often. They weren't Light Casters, though. Even Lena had noticed that at a young age. Everyone knew it, and harbored a bit of fear for them. They knew it themselves and didn't try to impersonate them. Light Casters were optimistic and resilient, made of beating hearts and tear soaked skin. They were the guardians, the protectors, the comfort of the world Leah knew.

They weren't Dark Casters, either. Where the Darkness had barely scraped at the Caster's morals, it had swallowed theirs whole. Those Casters didn't have a heartbeat, but they had the rain. They didn't have body heat, but they had a future. Leah had seen countless emotions motivate Ridley, and to a lesser extent, Sarafine. She had also seen emotion be their downfall. Dark Casters were made of cold motive and dark passions, of sins and rising ranks. They often lost themselves in such endeavors. Their success was their downfall, as there was only so far backstabbing could get them. Leah was almost glad they were above that, as Demons.

They weren't human. It was a simple fact, one she reiterated countless times when Macon became too much like one of _them_. She had never thought to use it with her fixation, though. The heels of her palms pressed into the newly dampened ground. They weren't natural. They weren't even _alive_. And if it was the tears of heaven that bathed the Mortals, then she saw it perfectly clear. They were the damned. The hell-bound creatures who put a farce and wore a sheep's skin. The flock of Mortals were fooled. But, suddenly, started to understand.

They were so engrossed in living a lie, of appealing to the Mortals, they could almost pass as Mortals. This was heaven's way of pulling the mask back. The Mortals would never know. The flock remained peacefully unaware. But the wolves slowly broke with the knowledge they would never be _human_. And maybe that was why they couldn't cry. Because there was always some part of their minds that rejected affection, that didn't understand the need of emotions. There was always some part holding onto what they truly were: predators among prey.

She felt the foggiest echoes of remorse for something she had never known. After that epiphany of an incident, she ran from storms to find solace in creating a more believable ruse.

She envied Macon a little for that. He was closed to feeling rain then she ever was. Then again, Macon was dead before he felt anything. She was sure his last thought was of his Lila Jane, not his dimming energy. Hunting was killed with the same lacking experience Leah had.

She supposed the only way she was going to change that was a slow death. A particular slow death that had her alive while she faded while the storm surged above her. Leah scoffed. Who was she kidding? She hadn't a heartbeat, another disturbingly blunt flaw in their disguise, so that last moment when one's heart gave out but they hadn't quite died was out of question.

She couldn't reverse what she was; no one would put her in an Arclight, that was certain. There wasn't a Cast known to her, or Macon, that would nullify it. There were Casts that imitated a heartbeat, but the pesky problem of water had escaped many Casters. She knew, if there was one, Macon would have utilized it. Or maybe he wouldn't have, being the self-torturing man he was.

But it didn't matter. They were the Demon Soldiers, the best of weapons, the machines of the Caster world. They were feared and whispered about in hushed tones, as though saying their species would make them appear. No one ridiculed them in fear of them. They were the perfect enemy, designed to look human enough to entice, but Demon enough to turn around and murder. They were the low of the dreamers and the damnable of the hopeless. They were those who followed a dark path because it brought an acceptance they couldn't replicate. Because every monster needed a companion, and the best way to find one was to fall into the crowd. They were the fallen angels, the ones who had potential that was dashed by genetics. They were the monsters among men, the ones Leah had heard about as a child. She had stopped worrying about her closet when she understood the monster was inside her. They were the actors who so desperately wanted to be human. Who would never feel the velvet run of raindrops.

In that respect, she couldn't blame Silas or Hunting. There was a sort of joy in demonizing oneself to the point of no longer believing the ruse. She doubted they worried about the rain, or their still hearts, or dry eyes. Part of her wished she could experience the touch of a soft drop of water. Another, smaller and logical, was glad she never had to.

That was why she ran from storms. Why she refused to search for a way to feel a velvet rain. It was the same reason she hesitated to use one of those heartbeat Casts. Because she knew once she felt it she would believe her own lie, as one wolf could believe himself a sheep under its stolen coat. Because when she came to, the mask would slip, and she would still be her. The Demon in search of humanity.

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My other inspiration was a quote a penpal of mine gave to me, a proverb that his country adores: Still waters run deep. They take it as 'still waters inhabit devils.' And that is why Leah runs. :)


End file.
